"A big challenge for the New Atheists is to engage not just our minds but also our hearts. If you like, our right brain as well as our left.

What seems to be missing from the atheist accounts of the human condition is an acknowledgement of our vulnerability and frailty, along with our sense of wonder and awe."

Who is 'we'? Who is 'our'? The New Atheists have already done an excellent job of engaging my 'heart' -- if by that you mean drawing out an emotional commitment to a secular world. A world in which four-year-olds no longer carry banners demanding that people be beheaded seems to me a goal worth fighting for, and I have no trouble committing myself to it emotionally. Nor, judging by the steady growth of atheism, do many other people.

Putting religion forward as a solution to our 'vulnerability and frailty' is particularly cheeky, since religion is largely responsible for much of what people perceive as their own weakness and guilt. Manufacturing an imaginary problem in order to provide an imaginary solution is what religion does best.

But let's agree that it can be reassuring to believe nonsense, even if that belief makes you riot in the streets when someone questions it. Is it a GOOD thing? Who here will vote for comforting lies over the disturbing truth? And is the truth really all that disturbing? There are millions of atheists who seem to have no problem with it whatsoever.

Posted by Jon J, Tuesday, 18 September 2012 8:16:04 AM

It consistently amazes and frustrates me that those who believe in a god seem to assume that those who don't are lacking in emotion, the capacity to feel wonder and awe, and a sense of 'the whole', whether it be the whole human or the whole universe.

On Sunday I attended a Conversation between Ian Robinson, former President of the Rationalist Society of Australia, and Rev. Paul Tonson of the Uniting Church in Nunawading in Melbourne, talking about "Spirituality without God". Ian described an experience he'd had many years ago which he said he could only describe as being like 'falling in love with the universe'. But, he went on to say, despite being intensely emotional and awe-inspiring, he felt no 'need' to ascribe to this experience any supernatural source or transcendental association.

Those who heard Richard Dawkins speak at the first Global Atheist Convention would remember that his topic, far from being a rallying call to stamp out religion and religionists, was a lyrical speech on "Gratitude" - gratitude at the beauty of nature, gratitude for the human capacity to understand and thereby appreciate both the complexity and the simplicity of nature. Such feelings of gratitude do not however imply that there is someone or something to which thanks are due. It's just the feeling of gratitude that the universe is so incredibly, wonderfully beautiful.

The human heart is not separate from the human mind, and reason is not separate from emotion.

Posted by anaminx, Tuesday, 18 September 2012 8:24:45 AM

The author is attacking a straw man. A straw man is an object ascribed to those who one is attacking which is not the product of the person or philosophy attacked but is the creation of the attacker. Atheism is merely the lack of belief in God. An atheist can have feelings of awe at seeing a baby or looking upward at the stars

The feeling of awe is neither the product of religion or atheism. It is simply a sense of wonder at being alive and realising the wonder of it. The straw man is the author's assumption that atheism claims to incorporate a sense of awe.

As Doestoyevsky said there is more to life than two times two equals four. However, one need not appeal to Christianity or any other religion to know that. Roughly half the world is not Christian. Would the author claim that among that half there are none who feel a sense of awe and wonder.

The item is merely another puff piece for Christianity which is merely one of many supernatural beliefs among humans. We can have a great sense of wonder when we reflect that we each grew from a single cell and the ancestors of that single cell reach back into the immensity of time. Elements in our bodies are the creations of the stars. Religious superstition by presenting fairy tale biblical explanations for the process denies our sense of wonder at our origins.

Posted by david f, Tuesday, 18 September 2012 8:47:17 AM

An appeal to emotion is fallacy, especially when applied as a de-facto appeal for belief in god/s.

Appealing to a couple of "authorities" such as Pascal or, 'god-forbid', Alain de Botton, is also fallacy, especially when appealing to emotion.

The heart as a focus for cognition of emotion is a straw-man - it is our brains and aspects of our sub-conscious & learned responses that determine emotion.

The Universe inspires awe in many, especially for the complexity and the simplicity of the basic chemistry and basic organo-chemistry that underpins it - there are 6 key elements to organo-chemistry of biology: C,H,N,O,P & S.

Throw in some Na, Cl, K,Ca, Fe, Mg, a few more in-organic elements, a few billion years, and hey presto!

Posted by McReal, Tuesday, 18 September 2012 9:16:36 AM

The regular appearance of articles such as this - that claim awe as the exclusive province of the religious - indicates to me a growing sense of discomfort within their flock. It seems that the very existence of rational thought worries them, and they secretly long for the days when the default option was an automatic belief in some kind of God or other.

It is unsurprising that they are getting nervous, and an interesting process to observe.

But it will not be the humourless "New Atheists" that change their views, but their own gradual realization that imagining an "author" of the universe is not only a pointless exercise, but it is entirely counterproductive. The atheist approach specifically permits a higher level of wonder and mystery at our amazing universe than that of someone whose approach comes to a grinding halt at the "it was God wot dunnit" level.

This attitude necessarily inhibits enquiry. After all, if you know the score of a football match ahead of time, you are far less inclined to watch it. What would be the point of exploring the origins of our universe, step by step getting closer to its starting-point, when you actively fear finding out anything that contradicts your preconceptions?

The other striking element of the piece is the reference to the "New Atheist" as their target for derision. Paradoxically, these folk are not the enemy of the religious. They are only an obvious target for comparison simply because they are so alike. Having organized themselves into a recognizable clique, "New Atheists" demand the same kind of loyalty to their cause that religious groups are so famous for.

The folk that theism should truly fear is not the self-promoting pseudo-intellectuals that join a club in order to big-note their supposed rationality, but the quiet, and growing, army of small-a atheists, who have come to their own conclusions, for their own reasons.

These are the people that will eventually render religions redundant.

Posted by Pericles, Tuesday, 18 September 2012 10:05:06 AM

This is very typical of the kind of essays that get published in the Australian in defense of Christianity. And of course the kind of naive simplistic posturing that the Centre For Public Christianity promotes. And the IPA too for that matter.

Appealing to "Pascal" (who lived 350 years ago) is a very common gambit with Christian apologists.

This is evidence of how spiritually bankrupt the Christian tradition has been ever since, so that it has not produced another authoritative voice to appeal to. If Christianity is supposedly true in the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries why arent there some authoritative voices who exemplified the tradition. Spirituality awake men or women who gave us reports based on their own direct experience of the Spiritual dimensions of their existence-being.

Experiences that were self-authenticating in and of them-selves. Experiences which did not require any reference to the Bible or the writings/rantings of long dead "authorities", whether Pascal, Aquinas or Augustine - that is all of the long dead half-imaginary comic-book "prophets" etc of the past.

Never mind that if anyone does the necessary serious homework they will find that there is no truth to be found in any of the usual religious propositions.

And of course the very last place that you will find the Living Divine Reality is at Ridley College, the Centre For Public Christianity or any of the "theology" outfits or organizations that are associated with them